Persia needs a regenerating cav archer - immortal.

thanks for the reply. I guess I'll still give the mod a try later on.

Aswaran has also been an issue of debate because of what it does. Although I think it's balanced considering the requirements to recover the research cost I considered changing it to be more defensive rather than economical. But there's still room for improvement or change as needed. I wanted to give Persians Battle Eles so they could still fulfill the fantasy of having a full Stable as they have before, and have a fallback ele unit if War Eles became too expensive in certain matches. Historically speaking elephants were used and although they already have War Eles it just didn't seem right for the Persians (or the Indians tbh) to miss out.

@Daverin Thanks! Balancing the mod has been a challenge when trying to fit the Sassanid theme of being almost entirely cavalry oriented and having strong cavalry archers. Most people on the subreddit weren't (naturally) open to the gameplay changes as they are quite drastic compared to the original civ, so I can understand why they would think aspects of the mod are too strong, too weak or unnecessary. I considered giving Persians a cav archer bonus of +1 range in Castle +1 in Imp instead of the curent one, but that seemed too strong on paper. A movement speed bonus was also on the cards. If you guys wanna experiment with those let me know, but I'm glad you found some enjoyment with the current bonus.

Hey guys! I appreciate the feedback. I haven't had a chance to look at this mod lately due to time constraints. It has been a struggle trying to get the changes to show in game and that's been putting me off the most.

@Milo Jurament-de-fer you're forgetting the cav archers, which are now FU except for Chemistry AND have a civ bonus which really adds up late game. They are now to go to ranged support for Persians as they have been historically for the Sassanids. The armies of Sassanid Persia almost entirely consisted of cavalry, and they were 1 of 3 civilisations who had the best cavalry archers in history, the other 2 being the Mongols and the Seljuks. Yes they still lack Arbalest but Bracer means at least they still get better XBows. Their lack of ranged siege until you get trebs means you have to rely on their faster eles or rams and build around that.

I haven't tried the mod out so I can't say. I like the idea, but what I miss the most from the persians are the archers. I don't care about Battle Elephants, mostly a useless addition to the Persians who possess a top tier Paladin with bonus against all archer units.
besides having no arbalest, no hand cannoneer and mediocre siege isn't a good thing. Where is you ranged support, how can you mass anything but scorpions (which aren't FU)?

I do have to say, the cav archer bonus is so... odd. They still have the delay, so they are not the hit and run guys you would expect, but when they do get the first shot off, they are darn near machine guns. Funny to watch.

thank you for making this mod. I was looking for something of the sort, however it's half a disappointment that archers are still weak and lack the final upgrade. That in theory makes sense, if we considered the Arbalest as an actual late medieval crossbowman, but in reality if you're making your changes based on the Sassanid empire, then the foot archers should be top notch - Persia has always boasted the best archers in the west, reason why the romans had countless Syrian auxiliaries as bowmen.
also sad that you seem to have dropped the mod.

I know you have probably moved on from this mod, but I just wanted to thank you all the same for even imagining it and going through in making it; I can't speak for balance at all, but I love how you reimagined the theme for the Persians. And I read the reddit thread where you announced this; suffice to say, there is absolutely nothing wrong with having both battle and war elephants. Last I checked, a common theme was that castle units were a luxury in many game modes, so another means of an elephant unit for a civ who often is remembered for elephants is just fair.

@Infiltr8ion_Unit yeah unfortunately that's not the case. If their overlapping was incorporated in the game it would've unnecessarily lead to a lot fewer civs or a lot more similar civs being in it.
@Venne ah cool thanks for clearing that up.
@[Salty] Euron Naharis Yeah I can consider removing Halb but Skirm seems overkill without compensating in some other way.

@King Gavin What the mod does is in the item description, but in a nutshell it modifies the Persian civ to be more historically accurate to the Sassanid Empire that AoE2 bases the civ on but also balanced, mostly by changing their tech tree but also an experimental civ bonus (which may change for balancing reasons).
@Alkhalim Thanks! I've been aiming for historical accuracy and making them as fun and balanced as possible, but I'm glad I got at least their thematic down.

Remove Scirm and Halb, else its broke af.

WHAT DO,S IT DO

Okay, I have to admit that these bonuses sound utterly broken, no doubt.
HOWEVER: It also looks thematic and flavorful as hell and this means as a fan from the historical and mapbuilding part of the game, this mod is a wonderful thing. :)

The Visigoths were an eastern European tribe that eventually occupied and ruled in the Spanish territories mostly, while the Franks were a Germanic tribe that ended up occupying and rulling all of Western Europe.

The Huns also go on to become Hungarians along with the Magyars, but yea admittedly all this reasoning is just my own imagining of the game and not going by anything written officially by the game. But yes you are right in that the timelines of all the civilisations do not match up perfectly, still I would have assumed that the Persians in the game, considering the resemblence of their architecture to the other "Islamic" civs are suposed to be a later Persian dynasty rather than an earlier one. However if the game explicitely says otherwise then I am probably wrong, lol, I haveen't read all the histories from inside the game :)

Hmm Interesting points... I always assumed the Goths in the game kinda were supposed to morph into the Franks but admiteedly that would overlap with the Franks in the game. The Goths also spread to many regions in Western Europe and remained in ruling and aristocratic circles in territories in Spain, Italy and Sweden, so one could sorta see the Goths in this game as a Germanc tribe that by the time it reaches the Imperial age of being one of the many other Medival kingdoms that the descendants of the Goths founded.

If you were playing as Sassanids you don't necessarily have to start strong then start over, because civs like the Goths and Huns who I mentioned before don't do that either and their timeline ended relatively early as well. I get what you mean by them starting off the way you mentioned, as a small Kurdish group then working their way up to become the Safavids, and that would've been fine, if ES actually wanted to base the civ on the Safavids. But going by the history page they didn't, yet the game does not reflect that. I am aiming to fix that with this mod. Do I have anything against the Safavids? No because I like them. Do I have anything against how the civ as a whole is portrayed in tha game? Yes, because the civ doesn't do either empire justice in terms of historical accuracy.

But I agree independent architecture and units would be really nice to see for the different civs.

Going by their page in the History section of the game ES clearly intended to base the Persians on the Sassanid Empire as that's what they have for their timeline (220-651 AD), hence the strong cavalry. However they also added the Safavids by giving them gunpowder but their timeline is from 1505-1736 AD, a huge difference in time periods between the two. Considering other civs like Goths and Huns who also have timelines finishing around 400-600 AD those civs still maintain historical accuracy to what they were during the time period they existed, the Persians don't. This mod is trying to maintain historical accuracy to the Sassanids who ES based them on using the above information, while keeping it balanced.

Also I don't really get how ES was trying to incorporate both Sassanid and Safavids in this, it just doesnt make much sense as to the very different origins of both dynasties and as you start the game in the "dark ages" with little in the way of military and you seem more "nomadic" than anything it would make sense the the Dark Age Persians in this game are something akin to the ancestors of the Safavids instead of the grand empire of the Sassanids. I kinda imagine a little Kurdish tribe of people in the Dark age, slowly gaining power and influence until they establish themselves as a powerhouse in the "Casstle Age" and "Imperial Age" when they become a fully fledged superpower.

If you were the Sassanids in the start you would be having Heavy Cavalry and a massive empire already, then you would get wiped out and start all over again haha

If you really want to mod the Persians I suggest getting rid of Ctesiphon as their wonder and putting something from the Safavid era there lol, it always bugged me that they built this thing in the Imperial Age which is clearly from earlier period. Perhaps Ali Qapu could be a contender but there are other monumental wonders from that period too...

In my opinion with things like Independent Unit and Independent Architecture the best mods ppl can make for this game are new skins for buildings and units, something desperately lacking in the base game.

The way I would look at it is that the Persians in this game have moved into the Safavid Dynasty by the time you hit Imperial age, this explains why they have gunpowder at that point, also think about it this way, the Imperial age in this game is roughly around the renaissance period, the Sassanids were from a way earlier period. In late Imperial along with the Ottomans and Indian Mughals the Safavids are one of the great gunpowder empires of the Islamic world, again reflected in this game by the fact that the Turks, Persians and Indians all get gunpowder in late game, you're kind of messing with that timeline I think. It makes no sense that the Sassanids are there fighting alongside Ottomans and Mughal Indians in late Imperial age. As for balance, they really don't need more buffs to their cavalry and having battle elephants AND war elephants just is redundant in my opinion.

If you could tell me what specific concerns you have for the mod and how I can better balance it I would greatly appreciate it.

I would also appreciate help from anyone who knows how to update the civ attributes in the tech tree without crashing the game if I try to open the tech tree. This is one of two reasons I haven't touched the Persians' civ bonuses, the other being that Persians already have strong civ bonuses so they don't really need any changing.

Thing is, Persians were already strong to begin with...if they got to lategame. This mod doesn't change that gameplay aspect about them in any way. What it does do is make them more historically accurate to the Sassanids this game bases them on while trying to keep them balanced, hence removing gunpowder (Except Cannon Galleons...for now). They're still strong but more expensive and easier to counter because they're more reliant on cavalry now. Aswaran will slightly mitigate the pressure on gold but you won't notice the difference until you get to lategame and start building large armies.

I got the impression ES were trying to incorporate both the Sassanids and Safavids into the Persian civ, but their history page has the timeline of the Sassanids. Although the Persians ended up being balanced they weren't historically accurate to either dynasty, staying in a middle ground so didn't do either justice. I'm tempted to do a Safavid mod in the future but right now I'm working to balance this one.

OP! Also judging by gunpowder etc the Persian civ here is based more Safavids than Sassanid era. Specially since they get the Islamic looking monsatry from castle age onwards...

this make the persians so overpower x)